Текст книги "William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition"

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3.3 Enter Bolingbroke Duke of Lancaster and Hereford, the Duke of York, the Earl of Northumberland, ⌈and soldiers, with drum and colours⌉

BOLINGBROKE

So that by this intelligence we learn

The Welshmen are dispersed, and Salisbury

Is gone to meet the King, who lately landed

With some few private friends upon this coast.

NORTHUMBERLAND

The news is very fair and good, my lord.

Richard not far from hence hath hid his head.

YORK

It would beseem the Lord Northumberland

To say ‘King Richard’. Alack the heavy day

When such a sacred king should hide his head!

NORTHUMBERLAND

Your grace mistakes. Only to be brief

Left I his title out.

YORK

The time hath been,

Would you have been so brief with him, he would

Have been so brief with you to shorten you,

For taking so the head, your whole head’s length.

BOLINGBROKE

Mistake not, uncle, further than you should.

YORK

Take not, good cousin, further than you should,

Lest you mistake the heavens are over our heads.

BOLINGBROKE

I know it, uncle, and oppose not myself

Against their will.

Enter Harry Percy ⌈and a trumpeter⌉

But who comes here?

Welcome, Harry. What, will not this castle yield?

HARRY PERCY

The castle royally is manned, my lord,

Against thy entrance.

BOLINGBROKE Royally?

Why, it contains no king.

HARRY PERCY

Yes, my good lord,

It doth contain a king. King Richard lies

Within the limits of yon lime and stone,

And with him are the Lord Aumerle, Lord Salisbury,

Sir Stephen Scrope, besides a clergyman

Of holy reverence; who, I cannot learn.

NORTHUMBERLAND

O, belike it is the Bishop of Carlisle.

BOLINGBROKE (to Northumberland) Noble lord,

Go to the rude ribs of that ancient castle;

Through brazen trumpet send the breath of parley

Into his ruined ears, and thus deliver.

Henry Bolingbroke

Upon his knees doth kiss King Richard’s hand,

And sends allegiance and true faith of heart

To his most royal person, hither come

Even at his feet to lay my arms and power,

Provided that my banishment repealed

And lands restored again be freely granted.

If not, I’ll use the advantage of my power,

And lay the summer’s dust with showers of blood

Rained from the wounds of slaughtered Englishmen;

The which how far off from the mind of Bolingbroke

It is such crimson tempest should bedrench

The fresh green lap of fair King Richard’s land,

My stooping duty tenderly shall show.

Go, signify as much, while here we march

Upon the grassy carpet of this plain.

Let’s march without the noise of threat‘ning drum,

That from this castle’s tottered battlements

Our fair appointments may be well perused.

Methinks King Richard and myself should meet

With no less terror than the elements

Of fire and water when their thund’ring shock

At meeting tears the cloudy cheeks of heaven.

Be he the fire, I’ll be the yielding water.

The rage be his, whilst on the earth I rain

My waters: on the earth, and not on him.—

March on, and mark King Richard, how he looks.

⌈They march about the stage; then Bolingbroke, York, Percy, and soldiers stand at a distance from the walls; Northumberland and trumpeter advance to the walls.⌉ The trumpets sound Fa parley without, and an answer within; then a flourish within.⌉ King Richard appeareth on the walls, with the Bishop of Carlisle, the Duke of Aumerle, ⌈Scrope, and the Earl of Salisbury⌉

See, see, King Richard doth himself appear,

As doth the blushing discontented sun

From out the fiery portal of the east

When he perceives the envious clouds are bent

To dim his glory and to stain the track

Of his bright passage to the occident.

YORK

Yet looks he like a king. Behold, his eye,

As bright as is the eagle’s, lightens forth

Controlling majesty. Alack, alack for woe

That any harm should stain so fair a show!

KING RICHARD (to Northumberland)

We are amazed; and thus long have we stood

To watch the fearful bending of thy knee,

Because we thought ourself thy lawful king.

An if we be, how dare thy joints forget

To pay their aweful duty to our presence?

If we be not, show us the hand of God

That hath dismissed us from our stewardship.

For well we know no hand of blood and bone

Can grip the sacred handle of our sceptre,

Unless he do profane, steal, or usurp.

And though you think that all—as you have done—

Have torn their souls by turning them from us,

And we are barren and bereft of friends,

Yet know my master, God omnipotent,

Is mustering in his clouds on our behalf

Armies of pestilence; and they shall strike

Your children yet unborn and unbegot,

That lift your vassal hands against my head

And threat the glory of my precious crown.

Tell Bolingbroke, for yon methinks he is,

That every stride he makes upon my land

Is dangerous treason. He is come to open

The purple testament of bleeding war;

But ere the crown he looks for live in peace

Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers’ sons

Shall ill become the flower of England’s face,

Change the complexion of her maid-pale peace

To scarlet indignation, and bedew

Her pastures’ grass with faithful English blood.

NORTHUMBERLAND ⌈kneeling⌉

The King of heaven forbid our lord the King

Should so with civil and uncivil arms

Be rushed upon. Thy thrice-noble cousin

Harry Bolingbroke doth humbly kiss thy hand,

And by the honourable tomb he swears,

That stands upon your royal grandsire’s bones,

And by the royalties of both your bloods,

Currents that spring from one most gracious head,

And by the buried hand of warlike Gaunt,

And by the worth and honour of himself,

Comprising all that may be sworn or said, no

His coming hither hath no further scope

Than for his lineal royalties, and to beg

Enfranchisement immediate on his knees;

Which on thy royal party granted once,

His glittering arms he will commend to rust,

His barbed steeds to stables, and his heart

To faithful service of your majesty.

This swears he as he is a prince and just,

And as I am a gentleman I credit him.

KING RICHARD

Northumberland, say thus the King returns:

His noble cousin is right welcome hither,

And all the number of his fair demands

Shall be accomplished without contradiction.

With all the gracious utterance thou hast,

Speak to his gentle hearing kind commends.

Northumberland and the trumpeter return to Bolingbroke

(To Aumerle) We do debase ourself, cousin, do we not,

To look so poorly and to speak so fair?

Shall we call back Northumberland, and send

Defiance to the traitor, and so die?

AUMERLE

No, good my lord, let’s fight with gentle words

Till time lend friends, and friends their helpful swords.

KING RICHARD

O God, O God, that e‘er this tongue of mine,

That laid the sentence of dread banishment

On yon proud man, should take it off again

With words of sooth! O, that I were as great

As is my grief, or lesser than my name,

Or that I could forget what I have been,

Or not remember what I must be now!

Swell’st thou, proud heart? I’ll give thee scope to beat,

Since foes have scope to beat both thee and me.

Northumberland advances to the walls

AUMERLE

Northumberland comes back from Bolingbroke.

KING RICHARD

What must the King do now? Must he submit?

The King shall do it. Must he be deposed?

The King shall be contented. Must he lose

The name of King? A God’s name, let it go.

I’ll give my jewels for a set of beads,

My gorgeous palace for a hermitage,

My gay apparel for an almsman’s gown,

My figured goblets for a dish of wood,

My sceptre for a palmer’s walking staff,

My subjects for a pair of carved saints,

And my large kingdom for a little grave,

A little, little grave, an obscure grave;

Or I’ll be buried in the King’s highway,

Some way of common trade where subjects’ feet

May hourly trample on their sovereign’s head,

For on my heart they tread now, whilst I live,

And buried once, why not upon my head?

Aumerle, thou weep‘st, my tender-hearted cousin.

We’ll make foul weather with despised tears.

Our sighs and they shall lodge the summer corn,

And make a dearth in this revolting land.

Or shall we play the wantons with our woes,

And make some pretty match with shedding tears;

As thus to drop them still upon one place

Till they have fretted us a pair of graves

Within the earth, and therein laid? ‘There lies

Two kinsmen digged their graves with weeping eyes.’

Would not this ill do well? Well, well, I see

I talk but idly and you mock at me.

Most mighty prince, my lord Northumberland,

What says King Bolingbroke? Will his majesty

Give Richard leave to live till Richard die?

You make a leg, and Bolingbroke says ‘Ay’.

NORTHUMBERLAND

My lord, in the base court he doth attend

To speak with you. May it please you to come down?

KING RICHARD

Down, down I come like glist’ring Phaethon,

Wanting the manage of unruly jades.

In the base court: base court where kings grow base

To come at traitors’ calls, and do them grace.

In the base court, come down: down court, down

King,

For night-owls shriek where mounting larks should sing.

Exeunt King Richard and his party

Northumberland returns to Bolingbroke

BOLINGBROKE

What says his majesty?

NORTHUMBERLAND Sorrow and grief of heart

Makes him speak fondly, like a frantic man.

Enter King Richard ⌈and his party⌉ below

Yet he is come.

BOLINGBROKE Stand all apart,

And show fair duty to his majesty.

He kneels down

My gracious lord.

KING RICHARD

Fair cousin, you debase your princely knee

To make the base earth proud with kissing it.

Me rather had my heart might feel your love

Than my unpleased eye see your courtesy.

Up, cousin, up. Your heart is up, I know,

Thus high at least, although your knee be low.

BOLINGBROKE

My gracious lord, I come but for mine own.

KING RICHARD

Your own is yours, and I am yours, and all.

BOLINGBROKE

So far be mine, my most redoubted lord,

As my true service shall deserve your love.

KING RICHARD

Well you deserve. They well deserve to have

That know the strong’st and surest way to get.

⌈Bolingbroke rises⌉

(To York) Uncle, give me your hands. Nay, dry your

eyes.

Tears show their love, but want their remedies.

(To Bolingbroke) Cousin, I am too young to be your father,

Though you are old enough to be my heir.

What you will have I’ll give, and willing too;

For do we must what force will have us do.

Set on towards London, cousin: is it so?

BOLINGBROKE

Yea, my good lord.

KING RICHARD Then I must not say no.

Flourish. Exeunt

3.4 Enter the Queen, with her two Ladies

QUEEN

What sport shall we devise here in this garden,

To drive away the heavy thought of care?

⌈first⌉ LADY Madam, we’ll play at bowls.

QUEEN

’Twill make me think the world is full of rubs,

And that my fortune runs against the bias.

⌈SECOND⌉ LADY Madam, we’ll dance.

QUEEN

My legs can keep no measure in delight

When my poor heart no measure keeps in grief;

Therefore no dancing, girl. Some other sport.

⌈FIRST⌉ LADY Madam, we’ll tell tales.

QUEEN Of sorrow or of joy?

⌈FIRST⌉ LADY Of either, madam.

QUEEN Of neither, girl.

For if of joy, being altogether wanting,

It doth remember me the more of sorrow.

Or if of grief, being altogether had,

It adds more sorrow to my want of joy.

For what I have I need not to repeat,

And what I want it boots not to complain.

⌈SECOND⌉ LADY

Madam, I’ll sing.

QUEEN

’Tis well that thou hast cause;

But thou shouldst please me better wouldst thou weep.

⌈SECOND⌉ LADY

I could weep, madam, would it do you good.

QUEEN

And I could sing, would weeping do me good,

And never borrow any tear of thee.

Enter a Gardener and two Men

But stay; here come the gardeners.

Let’s step into the shadow of these trees.

My wretchedness unto a row of pins

They will talk of state, for everyone doth so

Against a change. Woe is forerun with woe.

The Queen and her Ladies stand apart

GARDENER ⌈to First Man⌉

Go, bind thou up young dangling apricots

Which, like unruly children, make their sire

Stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight.

Give some supportance to the bending twigs.

⌈To Second Man⌉ Go thou, and, like an executioner,

Cut off the heads of too fast-growing sprays

That look too lofty in our commonwealth.

All must be even in our government.

You thus employed, I will go root away

The noisome weeds which without profit suck

The soil’s fertility from wholesome flowers.

⌈FIRST⌉ MAN

Why should we, in the compass of a pale,

Keep law and form and due proportion,

Showing as in a model our firm estate,

When our sea-wallèd garden, the whole land,

Is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked up,

Her fruit trees all unpruned, her hedges ruined,

Her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs

Swarming with caterpillars?

GARDENER Hold thy peace.

He that hath suffered this disordered spring

Hath now himself met with the fall of leaf.

The weeds which his broad spreading leaves did

shelter,

That seemed in eating him to hold him up,

Are plucked up, root and all, by Bolingbroke—

I mean the Earl of Wiltshire, Bushy, Green.

⌈SECOND⌉ MAN

What, are they dead?

GARDENER They are; and Bolingbroke

Hath seized the wasteful King. O, what pity is it

That he had not so trimmed and dressed his land

As we this garden! We at time of year

Do wound the bark, the skin of our fruit trees,

Lest, being over-proud in sap and blood,

With too much riches it confound itself.

Had he done so to great and growing men,

They might have lived to bear, and he to taste,

Their fruits of duty. Superfluous branches

We lop away, that bearing boughs may live.

Had he done so, himself had borne the crown,

Which waste of idle hours hath quite thrown down.

⌈FIRST⌉ MAN

What, think you then the King shall be deposed?

GARDENER

Depressed he is already, and deposed

’Tis doubt he will be. Letters came last night

To a dear friend of the good Duke of York’s

That tell black tidings.

QUEEN

O, I am pressed to death through want of speaking!

She comes forward

Thou, old Adam’s likeness, set to dress this garden,

How dares thy harsh rude tongue sound this unpleasing news?

What Eve, what serpent hath suggested thee

To make a second fall of cursed man?

Why dost thou say King Richard is deposed?

Dar‘st thou, thou little better thing than earth,

Divine his downfall? Say where, when, and how

Cam’st thou by this ill tidings? Speak, thou wretch!

GARDENER

Pardon me, madam. Little joy have I

To breathe this news, yet what I say is true.

King Richard he is in the mighty hold

Of Bolingbroke. Their fortunes both are weighed.

In your lord’s scale is nothing but himself

And some few vanities that make him light.

But in the balance of great Bolingbroke,

Besides himself, are all the English peers,

And with that odds he weighs King Richard down.

Post you to London and you will find it so.

I speak no more than everyone doth know.

QUEEN

Nimble mischance that art so light of foot,

Doth not thy embassage belong to me,

And am I last that knows it? O, thou think‘st

To serve me last, that I may longest keep

Thy sorrow in my breast. Come, ladies, go

To meet at London London’s king in woe.

What, was I born to this, that my sad look

Should grace the triumph of great Bolingbroke?

Gard’ner, for telling me these news of woe,

Pray God the plants thou graft’st may never grow.

Exit with her Ladies

GARDENER

Poor Queen, so that thy state might be no worse

I would my skill were subject to thy curse.

Here did she fall a tear. Here in this place

I’ll set a bank of rue, sour herb-of-grace.

Rue even for ruth here shortly shall be seen

In the remembrance of a weeping queen.

Exeunt

4.1 Enter, as to Parliament, Bolingbroke Duke of Lancaster and Hereford, the Duke of Aumerle, the Earl of Northumberland, Harry Percy, Lord Fitzwalter, the Duke of Surrey, the Bishop of Carlisle, and the Abbot of Westminster

BOLINGBROKE

Call forth Bagot.

Enter Bagot, with officers

Now, Bagot, freely speak thy mind:

What thou dost know of noble Gloucester’s death,

Who wrought it with the King, and who performed

The bloody office of his timeless end.

BAGOT

Then set before my face the Lord Aumerle.

BOLINGBROKE (to Aumerle)

Cousin, stand forth, and look upon that man.

Aumerle stands forth

BAGOT

My lord Aumerle, I know your daring tongue

Scorns to unsay what once it hath delivered.

In that dead time when Gloucester’s death was plotted

I heard you say ‘Is not my arm of length,

That reacheth from the restful English court

As far as Calais, to mine uncle’s head?’

Amongst much other talk that very time

I heard you say that you had rather refuse

The offer of an hundred thousand crowns

Than Bolingbroke’s return to England,

Adding withal how blest this land would be

In this your cousin’s death.

AUMERLE

Princes and noble lords,

What answer shall I make to this base man?

Shall I so much dishonour my fair stars

On equal terms to give him chastisement?

Either I must, or have mine honour soiled

With the attainder of his slanderous lips.

He throws down his gage

There is my gage, the manual seal of death

That marks thee out for hell. I say thou liest,

And will maintain what thou hast said is false

In thy heart blood, though being all too base

To stain the temper of my knightly sword.

BOLINGBROKE

Bagot, forbear. Thou shalt not take it up.

AUMERLE

Excepting one, I would he were the best

In all this presence that hath moved me so.

FITZWALTER

If that thy valour stand on sympathy,

There is my gage, Aumerle, in gage to thine.

He throws down his gage

By that fair sun which shows me where thou stand‘st,

I heard thee say, and vauntingly thou spak’st it,

That thou wert cause of noble Gloucester’s death.

If thou deny’st it twenty times, thou liest,

And I will turn thy falsehood to thy heart,

Where it was forged, with my rapier’s point.

AUMERLE

Thou dar’st not, coward, live to see that day.

FITZWALTER

Now by my soul, I would it were this hour.

AUMERLE

Fitzwalter, thou art damned to hell for this.

HARRY PERCY

Aumerle, thou liest. His honour is as true

In this appeal as thou art all unjust;

And that thou art so, there I throw my gage

He throws down his gage

To prove it on thee to the extremest point

Of mortal breathing. Seize it if thou dar’st.

AUMERLE

An if I do not, may my hands rot off,

And never brandish more revengeful steel

Over the glittering helmet of my foe.

SURREY

My lord Fitzwalter, I do remember well

The very time Aumerle and you did talk.

FITZWALTER

’Tis very true. You were in presence then,

And you can witness with me this is true.

SURREY

As false, by heaven, as heaven itself is true.

FITZWALTER

Surrey, thou liest.

SURREY Dishonourable boy,

That lie shall lie so heavy on my sword

That it shall render vengeance and revenge,

Till thou, the lie-giver, and that lie do lie

In earth as quiet as thy father’s skull;

In proof whereof, there is my honour’s pawn.

He throws down his gage

Engage it to the trial if thou dar’st.

FITZWALTER

How fondly dost thou spur a forward horse!

If I dare eat, or drink, or breathe, or live,

I dare meet Surrey in a wilderness

And spit upon him whilst I say he lies,

And lies, and lies. There is my bond of faith

To tie thee to my strong correction.

As I intend to thrive in this new world,

Aumerle is guilty of my true appeal.

Besides, I heard the banished Norfolk say

That thou, Aumerle, didst send two of thy men

To execute the noble Duke at Calais.

AUMERLE

Some honest Christian trust me with a gage.

He takes another’s gage and throws it down

That Norfolk lies, here do I throw down this,

If he may be repealed, to try his honour.

BOLINGBROKE

These differences shall all rest under gage

Till Norfolk be repealed. Repealed he shall be,

And, though mine enemy, restored again

To all his lands and signories. When he is returned,

Against Aumerle we will enforce his trial.

BISHOP OF CARLISLE

That honourable day shall never be seen.

Many a time hath banished Norfolk fought

For Jesu Christ in glorious Christian field,

Streaming the ensign of the Christian cross

Against black pagans, Turks, and Saracens;

And, toiled with works of war, retired himself

To Italy, and there at Venice gave

His body to that pleasant country’s earth,

And his pure soul unto his captain, Christ,

Under whose colours he had fought so long.

BOLINGBROKE

Why, Bishop of Carlisle, is Norfolk dead?

BISHOP OF CARLISLE

As surely as I live, my lord.

BOLINGBROKE

Sweet peace conduct his sweet soul to the bosom

Of good old Abraham! Lords appellants,

Your differences shall all rest under gage

Till we assign you to your days of trial.

Enter the Duke of York

YORK

Great Duke of Lancaster, I come to thee

From plume-plucked Richard, who with willing soul

Adopts thee heir, and his high sceptre yields

To the possession of thy royal hand.

Ascend his throne, descending now from him,

And long live Henry, of that name the fourth!

BOLINGBROKE

In God’s name I’ll ascend the regal throne.

BISHOP OF CARLISLE Marry, God forbid!

Worst in this royal presence may I speak,

Yet best beseeming me to speak the truth.

Would God that any in this noble presence

Were enough noble to be upright judge

Of noble Richard. Then true noblesse would

Learn him forbearance from so foul a wrong.

What subject can give sentence on his king?

And who sits here that is not Richard’s subject?

Thieves are not judged but they are by to hear,

Although apparent guilt be seen in them;

And shall the figure of God’s majesty,

His captain, steward, deputy elect,

Anointed, crowned, planted many years,

Be judged by subject and inferior breath,

And he himself not present? O, forfend it, God,

That in a Christian climate souls refined

Should show so heinous, black, obscene a deed!

I speak to subjects, and a subject speaks

Stirred up by God thus boldly for his king.

My lord of Hereford here, whom you call king,

Is a foul traitor to proud Hereford’s king;

And, if you crown him, let me prophesy

The blood of English shall manure the ground,

And future ages groan for this foul act.

Peace shall go sleep with Turks and infidels,

And in this seat of peace tumultuous wars

Shall kin with kin and kind with kind confound.

Disorder, horror, fear, and mutiny

Shall here inhabit, and this land be called

The field of Golgotha and dead men’s skulls.

O, if you rear this house against this house

It will the woefullest division prove

That ever fell upon this cursed earth!

Prevent, resist it; let it not be so,

Lest child, child’s children, cry against you woe.

NORTHUMBERLAND

Well have you argued, sir, and for your pains

Of capital treason we arrest you here.

My lord of Westminster, be it your charge

To keep him safely till his day of trial.

May it please you, lords, to grant the Commons’ suit?

BOLINGBROKE

Fetch hither Richard, that in common view

He may surrender. So we shall proceed

Without suspicion.

YORK

I will be his conduct.

Exit

BOLINGBROKE

Lords, you that here are under our arrest,

Procure your sureties for your days of answer.

Little are we beholden to your love,

And little looked for at your helping hands.

Enter Richard and the Duke of York, ⌈with attendants bearing the crown and sceptre⌉

RICHARD

Alack, why am I sent for to a king

Before I have shook off the regal thoughts

Wherewith I reigned? I hardly yet have learned

To insinuate, flatter, bow, and bend my knee.

Give sorrow leave awhile to tutor me

To this submission. Yet I well remember

The favours of these men. Were they not mine?

Did they not sometime cry ‘All haill’ to me?

So Judas did to Christ. But He in twelve

Found truth in all but one; I, in twelve thousand, none.

God save the King ! Will no man say ‘Amen’ ?

Am I both priest and clerk? Well then, Amen.

God save the King, although I be not he.

And yet Amen, if heaven do think him me.

To do what service am I sent for hither?

YORK

To do that office of thine own good will

Which tired majesty did make thee offer:

The resignation of thy state and crown

To Henry Bolingbroke.

RICHARD (to an attendant)

Give me the crown. (To Bolingbroke) Here, cousin, seize the crown.

Here, cousin. On this side my hand, on that side thine.

Now is this golden crown like a deep well

That owes two buckets filling one another,

The emptier ever dancing in the air,

The other down, unseen, and full of water.

That bucket down and full of tears am I,

Drinking my griefs, whilst you mount up on high.

BOLINGBROKE

I thought you had been willing to resign.

RICHARD

My crown I am, but still my griefs are mine.

You may my glories and my state depose,

But not my griefs; still am I king of those.

BOLINGBROKE

Part of your cares you give me with your crown.

RICHARD

Your cares set up do not pluck my cares down.

My care is loss of care by old care done;

Your care is gain of care by new care won.

The cares I give I have, though given away;

They ’tend the crown, yet still with me they stay.

BOLINGBROKE

Are you contented to resign the crown?

RICHARD

Ay, no; no, ay; for I must nothing be;

Therefore no, no, for I resign to thee.

Now mark me how I will undo myself.

I give this heavy weight from off my head,

[Bolingbroke accepts the crown]

And this unwieldy sceptre from my hand,

⌈Bolingbroke accepts the sceptre⌉

The pride of kingly sway from out my heart.

With mine own tears I wash away my balm,

With mine own hands I give away my crown,

With mine own tongue deny my sacred state,

With mine own breath release all duteous oaths.

All pomp and majesty I do forswear.

My manors, rents, revenues I forgo.

My acts, decrees, and statutes I deny.

God pardon all oaths that are broke to me.

God keep all vows unbroke are made to thee.

Make me, that nothing have, with nothing grieved,

And thou with all pleased, that hast all achieved.

Long mayst thou live in Richard’s seat to sit,

And soon lie Richard in an earthy pit.

‘God save King Henry,’ unkinged Richard says,

‘And send him many years of sunshine days.’

What more remains?

NORTHUMBERLAND (giving Richard papers)

No more but that you read

These accusations and these grievous crimes

Committed by your person and your followers

Against the state and profit of this land,

That by confessing them, the souls of men

May deem that you are worthily deposed.

RICHARD

Must I do so? And must I ravel out

My weaved-up follies ? Gentle Northumberland,

If thy offences were upon record,

Would it not shame thee in so fair a troop

To read a lecture of them? If thou wouldst,

There shouldst thou find one heinous article

Containing the deposing of a king

And cracking the strong warrant of an oath,

Marked with a blot, damned in the book of heaven.

Nay, all of you that stand and look upon

Whilst that my wretchedness doth bait myself,

Though some of you, with Pilate, wash your hands,

Showing an outward pity, yet you Pitates

Have here delivered me to my sour cross,

And water cannot wash away your sin.

NORTHUMBERLAND

My lord, dispatch. Read o’er these articles.

RICHARD

Mine eyes are full of tears; I cannot see.

And yet salt water blinds them not so much

But they can see a sort of traitors here.

Nay, if I turn mine eyes upon myself

I find myself a traitor with the rest,

For I have given here my soul’s consent

T’undeck the pompous body of a king,

Made glory base and sovereignty a slave,

Proud majesty a subject, state a peasant.

NORTHUMBERLAND My lord—

RICHARD

No lord of thine, thou haught-insulting man,

Nor no man’s lord. I have no name, no title,

No, not that name was given me at the font,

But ’tis usurped. Alack the heavy day,

That I have worn so many winters out

And know not now what name to call myself!

O, that I were a mockery king of snow,

Standing before the sun of Bolingbroke

To melt myself away in water-drops !

Good king, great king—and yet not greatly good—

An if my word be sterling yet in England,

Let it command a mirror hither straight,

That it may show me what a face I have,

Since it is bankrupt of his majesty.

BOLINGBROKE

Go some of you and fetch a looking-glass.

Exit one or more

NORTHUMBERLAND

Read o’er this paper while the glass doth come.

RICHARD

Fiend, thou torment’st me ere I come to hell.

BOLINGBROKE

Urge it no more, my lord Northumberland.

NORTHUMBERLAND

The Commons will not then be satisfied.

RICHARD

They shall be satisfied. I’ll read enough

When I do see the very book indeed

Where all my sins are writ, and that’s myself.

Enter one with a glass

Give me that glass, and therein will I read.

Richard takes the glass and looks in it

No deeper wrinkles yet? Hath sorrow struck

So many blows upon this face of mine

And made no deeper wounds? O flatt’ring glass,

Like to my followers in prosperity,

Thou dost beguile me! Was this face the face

That every day under his household roof

Did keep ten thousand men? Was this the face

That like the sun did make beholders wink?

Is this the face which faced so many follies,

That was at last outfaced by Bolingbroke?

A brittle glory shineth in this face.

As brittle as the glory is the face,

He shatters the glass

For there it is, cracked in an hundred shivers.

Mark, silent King, the moral of this sport:

How soon my sorrow hath destroyed my face.

BOLINGBROKE

The shadow of your sorrow hath destroyed

The shadow of your face.

RICHARD

Say that again:

‘The shadow of my sorrow’—ha, let’s see.

‘Tis very true: my grief lies all within,

And these external manner of laments

Are merely shadows to the unseen grief

That swells with silence in the tortured soul.

There lies the substance, and I thank thee, King,

For thy great bounty that not only giv’st

Me cause to wail, but teachest me the way

How to lament the cause. I’ll beg one boon,

And then be gone and trouble you no more.

Shall I obtain it?

BOLINGBROKE

Name it, fair cousin.

RICHARD

Fair cousin? I am greater than a king;

For when I was a king my flatterers

Were then but subjects; being now a subject,

I have a king here to my flatterer.

Being so great, I have no need to beg.

BOLINGBROKE Yet ask.

RICHARD And shall I have?

BOLINGBROKE You shall.

RICHARD Then give me leave to go.

BOLINGBROKE Whither?

RICHARD

Whither you will, so I were from your sights.

BOLINGBROKE

Go some of you, convey him to the Tower.

RICHARD

O good, ‘convey’! Conveyors are you all,

That rise thus nimbly by a true king’s fall.

⌈Exit, guarded⌉

BOLINGBROKE

On Wednesday next we solemnly set down

Our coronation. Lords, prepare yourselves.

Exeunt all but the Abbot of Westminster, the Bishop of Carlisle, and Aumerle

ABBOT OF WESTMINSTER

A woeful pageant have we here beheld.

BISHOP OF CARLISLE

The woe’s to come, the children yet unborn

Shall feel this day as sharp to them as thorn.

AUMERLE

You holy clergymen, is there no plot

To rid the realm of this pernicious blot?

ABBOT OF WESTMINSTER